VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES & INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

LEARNING THEORIES

FINAL ASSIGNMENT

Question assignment: Develop one lesson, an English short course/syllabus or an

intervention programme for your students or research participants.

Lecturer: Tạ Thị Thanh Hoa, PhD

Student: Pham Anh Thư

Class: QH2022D2

Student’s ID: 22045280

Hanoi, 2023
Introduction:
Learning is a complex process. Educators and researchers have focused on this topics
over the years. The idea about “learning” has been defined by many scholars. According
to Ambrose et al (2010), Learning is “a process that leads to change, which occurs as a
result of experience and increases the potential for improved performance and future
learning” . As a teaching, understanding learning process is crucial as it provide profound
ideas for teachers to choose the pedagogical methods, topics, and assessment tools.
The concept of learning has been changed a lot over the decades. In the past, learning is
defined as a passive of receiving information, working individually. Recently, the idea
has been modern, it is believed that learning occurs when students actively engage with
the information. Teachers respect students’ differences and both individual and collective
activities are included in teaching. Besides, students themselves are the ones who learn;
learning is not something that is done to them. It is directly related to how pupils make
sense of and react to their experiences.
There are five main learning theories that many teachers rely on: behaviourism,
cognitive, constructivism, humanism, connectivism.
As an English teacher in a secondary school, most of my students are fond of physical
activities; therefore, my lesson plans are often designed based on behaviourism
Behaviourism theory:
The two main founders of behaviorist methods to learning are John B. Watson (1878–
1958) and B. F. Skinner (1904–1990). Watson thought that particular stimuli eliciting
particular responses led to the behavior that people displayed. Watson's fundamental
thesis was that inferences about human growth have to be grounded in the study of overt
behavior rather than conjecture regarding latent cognitive processes or subconscious
motivations (Shaffer, 2000).
Watson based his research on Pavlov's observations of animal reactions to stimuli.
Pavlov, for instance, sounded a bell to signal when his dog was about to be fed. Because
the dog had been trained to eat at this time, Pavlov's dog would salivate when the bell
rang. Because of this behavior, Pavlov concluded that dogs were conditioned to react to
outside stimuli. Therefore, Pavlov thought that people could be trained to react in a
similar way to similar stimuli. To bolster his theories, Pavlov showed how a distinct
musical tone—which has never been associated with food—could cause comparable
human behavior (Thomas, 1997). Expanding on Watson’s basic stimulus-response model,
Skinner proposed a more comprehensive conditioning which is called operant
conditioning. The operant conditioning contains four main principles which are
reinforcement, punishment, extinction and schedules of reinforcement. Some key
concepts related to four main principles are summarized in the table below:
Reinforcement Positive Reinforcement stimulus that, when added
to or introduced into a
situation, increases the
possibility of a behavior
Negative Reinforcement stimulus that, when added
to or introduced into a
situation, increases the
possibility of a behavior
Punishment Positive Punishment introducing an unpleasant
stimulus to reduce a habit.
Negative Punishment reducing a behavior by
taking away a pleasurable
or desired stimulus.
Extinction The process of extinction involves taking away a
behavior's reinforcement, which lowers the frequency of
the behavior.
Schedules of reinforcement Continuous reinforcement There is reinforcement
each time the behavior
takes place.
Fixed-ratio reinforcement After a predetermined
number of occurrences of
 the behavior, reinforcement
is given.
Variable-ratio After the behavior occurs
reinforcement an unpredictable number of
times, reinforcement is
given.
Fixed-interval Regardless of how often
reinforcement the behavior has happened,
reinforcement is given after
a predetermined period of
time.

There are some teaching methods are developed based on behaviourism theory including:
Total Physical Response (TPR), Audiolingual Method, Drilling techniques, Behavior
Modification in error correction, and Reinforcement.

II. An English lesson plan

1. Teaching context:
Currently, I am working as secondary English teacher. My students are from 11 to 14
years old. Most of them are beginners. Each week, my students has 3 English lessons,
each lesson lasts for 45 minutes. There are 6 units in one semester, each unit is divided
into 7 lessons. The first lesson provides the overview of the lessons, it introduces the
topic and the grammar point in a dialogue. The second lesson focused on building
vocabulary and the third lesson provides grammar point. The next two lesson are skills
lesson. Two skills are combined with others (Reading and Speaking, Listening and
Writing). The last lesson summarizes all the knowledge of the whole unit and students
have a chance to do some interesting project.
The class size is quite big, there are about 45 to 54 students in a class. Due to the time
limitations and big class size, students do not have many opportunities to practice all the
skills in class. Besides, it is hard for teachers to organize learning activities that require
students moving around the classroom.
Therefore, students need to prepare lesson at home, for example: brainstorming the idea
for writing task or speaking task.
2. Lesson:
The lesson I choose is lesson 2 – Unit 6: Tet holiday. Now, Tet is coming; therefore, the
topic may attract my students’ attention. The vocabulary set are some activities
Vietnamese people often do on Tet holiday. I believe that these lexical items are familiar
with my students and they can use them very often during Tet.
The set of the activities are: have fun, visit relatives, give lucky money, make a wish,
clean the furniture, watch firework.
In addition to the vocabulary, students need to identify 2 sounds /∫/ and /s/

3. Students:
This lesson plan is designed for a class that contains 42 students in grade 6. Their
language ability are various, and their learning styles are different. Some of my students
are actively attend to the activities in the lesson; however, some of them are not confident
to speak in front of class, and lack of motivation. Some of them has short attention span.
Most of them like physical activities and has competitive spirit.

4. The lesson plan

Activity Rationale
Warm-up: (5 minutes)
Teacher divides class into 4 teams, they - The activity help activate students prior
are going to work in group to solve a knowledge.
crossword, the words are some food or - Besides, it also creates a positive
things that children often see on Tet competitive environment. They are aware
holiday of the benefits they get when they
Each correct answer, the team will get one participate in any activities during the
point. lessons. (positive reinforcement)
The point will be counted until the end of - The activity also attracts students’
the lesson attention and raises students’ interest
At the end of the lesson, the team has
more points will be the winner. They will
be give bonus points in the next mini-test
or small gifts
Teacher leads to the lesson. Teacher will The stage will help students clear about
inform students the lesson objectives and the content and the goal that they need to
the content they will learn in the lesson (3 achieve at the end of the lesson
minutes)
Activity 1: (7 minutes)
- Teacher will present the new words by - For behaviourists, rrepetition plays a
employing different techniques: showing crucial role. According to John Watson
pictures, doing actions, putting the words (1920) suggested that The strength of the
in a sentence, and etc. habit increases with the frequency with
Set of words: which a stimulus and response occur
have fun, visit relatives, give lucky together.
money: showing pictures Therefore, I often asks my students to
make a wish, clean the furniture, watch repeat the new words to help them
firework: doing actions remember the new words as much as
- Teacher asks students to repeat the words possible.
individually, in pairs or in group
Activity 2: Practice vocabulary (10
minutes) Students have a chance to compete to
In this activity students need to rearrange other friends, which may motivates
the letters to make the correct words students a lot. Besides, it changes the pace
Each team will be give a pen and a white of the lesson.
board
Teacher shows the questions on the slide
=> students write the answer => raise their
board => say aloud the word
 The faster will get the point
Activity 3: Pronunciation (7 minutes)
Teacher shows a video to guide students Modelling is an important stage in
how to pronounce the sound. behaviourism theory. Modeling is the
Teacher guide students steps by steps process of acting out desired behaviors so
Teacher can pause the video and ask that students can watch and follow along.
students follow Teachers can serve as positive role models
Besides, teacher can model by modeling appropriate behavior and
giving examples of how to carry out
particular tasks or respond to particular
circumstances.

In this case, teacher shows students how

to open the mouth, put the tongue in
correct position
Activity 4: Pronunciation practice: (5
minutes)
Students will listen to the sound in the
words then repeat the words
After that, they will try to find their own
words
Recap: (5 mintues)
Teacher counts the total points. Students know what they have learnt
Inform the winner to the whole class. It motivates pupils to replicate positive
Reward students actions and accomplish their objectives.
It increases pupils' confidence and sense
 of self.
It creates a supportive and encouraging
learning environment.

Conclusion
Behaviourism offers many benefits to the educators and students. By employing
behaviourism, students are praised because of their contribution. Consequently, they may
repeat their positive actions in the next lesson. Moreover, in one lesson plan, teacher can
use more than one theory. I believe that there is no lesson that just use one method can be
a successful lesson. Therefore, as a teacher, I should be flexible in choosing method I put
in my lesson. Based on my students’ characteristics, and learning styles, the activities I
designed based on behaviourism much more than other theories.
Reference:
Watson, J. B. (1913). Psychology as the behaviorist views it. Psychological Review,
20(2), 158–177.

B.F. Skinner (1938). The behavior of organisms. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., & Norman, M. K.
(2010). How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching (1st
ed.). Jossey-Bass.